


Clandestine

by makokitten



Category: Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-02
Updated: 2012-06-02
Packaged: 2017-11-06 16:10:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/420798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/makokitten/pseuds/makokitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes there really is only one way to get the information you need, and that way involves undressing your fake boss before his birthday party.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clandestine

* * *

_“I’d do whatever I wanted to do, with whoever I wanted to do it with.”_

* * *

            After delivering that line, Natasha Romanoff gives Tony Stark about thirty seconds before he calls her back.  She takes her time walking away, counting to herself—and hears “Hey, Natalie,” just after she gets to fifteen.  The innuendos and that vodka martini really did the trick, apparently.

            She pivots back around to face him, halfway out the door.  Natalie from legal has a sort of placid charm that enables her to say the most suggestive things with an innocent face, so Natasha makes herself look questioning, a little expectant, but not overeager.  Standing there, just like that, her hands folded, she waits for him to say something else, and hopes that he won’t lose his nerve.

            He doesn’t.  “Come back,” he says, patting the armrest she’d been sitting on before.  “Just for a minute.  I’m not in that much of a hurry to go out there.” 

            Natasha comes to him and sits back down, legs crossed at the ankle.  Her feet are close enough that they barely brush his—innocent, accidental contact—and she sweeps her hair back over one shoulder to expose her neck.   A gesture of submission.  Quietly, she watches him watch her.  He’d said she was hard to get a read on, but men are easy to read, and lonely men are the easiest.  Tony Stark is lonely, and also desperate.  Very easy.  If she’d been sent to kill him, not assess him, he’d be dead three times over by now.

            She doesn’t think she’ll mention what’s about to happen in her report to SHIELD.

            “You walked away,” Tony says.  “We were still—talking, I thought.”

            “Oh,” Natasha says, blinking.  “I’m sorry.”

            “I mean,” Tony continues, “unless you didn’t want to keep talking.”  His speech isn’t slurred yet—it will be later, undoubtedly—but he’s definitely rambling.  He sounds a little unsure, which is almost endearing.  She’d probably be discombobulated too if her pulse was jumping like that.

            “I can talk.”

            “Well, no, I meant—”  He raises a hand, waves it vaguely in the air.  “What I meant was that it might be a little unprofessional.  To keep… talking.”  When he sets the hand back down, it’s just above her knee.

            Natasha looks at him, trying to analyze everything she can.  He wants her, that’s clear, but there _are_ reservations there—what does he have to be afraid of?  Another woman’s wrath?  Himself?  Dying?  Dying’s an obvious answer, but it shouldn’t manifest itself here… then again, when you’re dying, it tends to manifest everywhere.  Natasha knows Tony’s dying, but she doesn’t know how close he is to being dead.  That’s what she’s trying to figure out. 

            “It’s your birthday,” she replies, reaching forward to adjust the collar of his shirt.  It’s a chaste touch, but her fingers brush the skin of his throat, softly; she’s interested, or so she wants him to believe.  His eyes are large and brown and soft.  _Four times over_ , she thinks.  _He’d be bleeding on the floor by now._   But those aren’t her orders, and she doesn’t even want him dead.  She smiles a little, just with her mouth.  “I’ll strike this from the record, shall I?” 

            “That would probably be good.”  The hand on her knee shifts up, very quickly, to her waist.  He pulls her down to his lap, and she doesn’t resist.  She can smell the alcohol on his breath, and wonders if she should pity him or revile him.  She does neither.  Oddly enough, Natasha’s feelings toward Tony are neutral, except when he’s out almost getting himself killed.  Then, he’s a source of frustration.  Overall, though, she’s met worse men, and better men, than Tony Stark. 

            Breathing out, Tony snakes his other arm around her back and brings his dominant hand up to brush her hair away.  “Still having a hard time reading you,” he says. 

            “Should I make it easier for you?” 

            “Please.” 

            She leans forward to kiss him.  He tastes like the martini and whatever he’s been drinking to subvert the effects of the palladium, and his facial hair scratches a little, but he responds warmly, enthusiastically.  Seduction’s not really a technique Natasha’s used much since joining up with SHIELD, and she can’t say that she misses it, but at least Tony is a good kisser.  He’s not grabbing her, or groping her, or trying to stick his tongue down her throat.  He just takes it slow at first, and lets the kiss evolve naturally into something deeper before bringing his hand up behind her head to keep her in place.  She braces herself against his chest, and when he pulls away from her, he smiles.

            “Was this the plan?” he asks her. 

            “Hm?”

            “All along,” he says.  “Was this the plan, did you want to—I mean, frankly, you could have just _asked_ —”

            “Mr. Stark?”

            “Yeah?” 

            She leans in again, closes the distance between them, and presses a soft, quick kiss to his lips.  “Stop talking.” 

            “Good idea,” he says, and he does. 

            Natasha kisses him some more to make sure he has his guard down before she goes for the buttons of his shirt.  _This_ was the plan all along—she needs to see just how sick he is so she can report back.  She tried walking in on him when he wasn’t fully dressed a couple of times, feigning cluelessness, but he was always quick to cover himself, which, for a man of Tony’s renowned shamelessness, means that he’s hiding something.  This time, she has her way.  His tongue is so tangled in hers that when he notices she’s undone most of his buttons, it’s already too late.  He leans back, tries to take her hands in his own and say, “You don’t need to do that,” but by then she’s already seen it.

            “Oh my god,” she says, and she doesn’t need to fake the shock.  The infected veins spiderwebbing out from the arc reactor cover most of Tony’s chest.  From what the SHEILD models had projected, she didn’t think his condition would have deteriorated this rapidly…

            “No, it’s all right,” he says.  “It doesn’t hu— _urt_.”  But it does; when she rests a hand on his bare chest, gently, he winces.  His inflamed skin almost burns to touch.

            Natasha can’t think of anything to say.

            Tony takes care of that for her.  “Don’t worry,” he babbles, “It’s not—it isn’t, um, sexually transmitted, you can’t get it.  Just a rash from the reactor, it just… flares up sometimes…”

            “I have to go,” she says quickly, standing and straightening her dress. 

            “Natalie, wait.”  He catches her hand, and she turns back to face him.  He looks very lost, almost afraid.  Afraid of her, but for the wrong reasons.  “Don’t tell Pe—anyone.  Please.”

            Natasha exhales, and then, in a show of admirable professionalism, reaches down to button him back up.  “Don’t worry, Mr. Stark,” she says, smoothing his shirt out with her hands.  “I won’t.”

            When she walks away this time, he doesn’t call her back.  Good.  As soon as she’s out of earshot, she pops her Bluetooth in her ear and dials Nick Fury.  He’ll want to know.  This is urgent. 

            “Agent Romanoff?”

            “Director Fury.”  That’s as close to a friendly greeting as the circumstances allow.  “It’s bad.”

            “How bad?”

            “Bad.”  Natasha glances over her shoulder, at Tony’s room.  “We’re going to have to give him something for the symptoms if we want him to be at all functional.” 

            Nick Fury sounds tired.  By all accounts, he’s having a hectic week.  This won’t help.  “Leave it to me.  I want you back at that party.”

            “Yes, sir.”

            And that’s all.  Natasha hangs up.  It’s going to be quite a night, she can already tell.  She sighs, and goes to change.


End file.
